How to rotate a 3D object on axis three.js?

Question

I have a great problem about the rotation in three.js I want to rotate my 3D cube in one of my game.

//init
geometry = new THREE.CubeGeometry grid, grid, grid
material = new THREE.MeshLambertMaterial {color:0xFFFFFF * Math.random(), shading:THREE.FlatShading, overdraw:true, transparent: true, opacity:0.8}
for i in [[email protected]]
    othergeo = new THREE.Mesh new THREE.CubeGeometry(grid, grid, grid)
    othergeo.position.x = grid * @shape[i][0]
    othergeo.position.y = grid * @shape[i][1]
    THREE.GeometryUtils.merge geometry, othergeo
@mesh = new THREE.Mesh geometry, material

//rotate
@mesh.rotation.y += y * Math.PI / 180
@mesh.rotation.x += x * Math.PI / 180
@mesh.rotation.z += z * Math.PI / 180

and (x, y, z) may be (1, 0, 0)

then the cube can rotate, but the problem is the cube rotate on its own axis,so after it has rotated, it can't rotate as expected.

I find the page How to rotate a Three.js Vector3 around an axis?, but it just let a Vector3 point rotate around the world axis?

and I have tried to use matrixRotationWorld as

@mesh.matrixRotationWorld.x += x * Math.PI / 180
@mesh.matrixRotationWorld.y += y * Math.PI / 180
@mesh.matrixRotationWorld.z += z * Math.PI / 180

but it doesn't work, I don't whether I used it in a wrong way or there are other ways..

so, how to let the 3D cube rotate around the world's axis???

Answer 1

Here are the two functions I use. They are based on matrix rotations. and can rotate around arbitrary axes. To rotate using the world's axes you would want to use the second function rotateAroundWorldAxis().

// Rotate an object around an arbitrary axis in object space
var rotObjectMatrix;
function rotateAroundObjectAxis(object, axis, radians) {
    rotObjectMatrix = new THREE.Matrix4();
    rotObjectMatrix.makeRotationAxis(axis.normalize(), radians);

    // old code for Three.JS pre r54:
    // object.matrix.multiplySelf(rotObjectMatrix);      // post-multiply
    // new code for Three.JS r55+:
    object.matrix.multiply(rotObjectMatrix);

    // old code for Three.js pre r49:
    // object.rotation.getRotationFromMatrix(object.matrix, object.scale);
    // old code for Three.js r50-r58:
    // object.rotation.setEulerFromRotationMatrix(object.matrix);
    // new code for Three.js r59+:
    object.rotation.setFromRotationMatrix(object.matrix);
}

var rotWorldMatrix;
// Rotate an object around an arbitrary axis in world space       
function rotateAroundWorldAxis(object, axis, radians) {
    rotWorldMatrix = new THREE.Matrix4();
    rotWorldMatrix.makeRotationAxis(axis.normalize(), radians);

    // old code for Three.JS pre r54:
    //  rotWorldMatrix.multiply(object.matrix);
    // new code for Three.JS r55+:
    rotWorldMatrix.multiply(object.matrix);                // pre-multiply

    object.matrix = rotWorldMatrix;

    // old code for Three.js pre r49:
    // object.rotation.getRotationFromMatrix(object.matrix, object.scale);
    // old code for Three.js pre r59:
    // object.rotation.setEulerFromRotationMatrix(object.matrix);
    // code for r59+:
    object.rotation.setFromRotationMatrix(object.matrix);
}

So you should call these functions within your anim function (requestAnimFrame callback), resulting in a rotation of 90 degrees on the x-axis:

var xAxis = new THREE.Vector3(1,0,0);
rotateAroundWorldAxis(mesh, xAxis, Math.PI / 180);

Answer 2

Since release r59, three.js provides those three functions to rotate a object around object axis.

object.rotateX(angle);
object.rotateY(angle);
object.rotateZ(angle);

Answer 3

I needed the rotateAroundWorldAxis function but the above code doesn't work with the newest release (r52). It looks like getRotationFromMatrix() was replaced by setEulerFromRotationMatrix()

function rotateAroundWorldAxis( object, axis, radians ) {

    var rotationMatrix = new THREE.Matrix4();

    rotationMatrix.makeRotationAxis( axis.normalize(), radians );
    rotationMatrix.multiplySelf( object.matrix );                       // pre-multiply
    object.matrix = rotationMatrix;
    object.rotation.setEulerFromRotationMatrix( object.matrix );
}

Answer 4

with r55 you have to change
rotationMatrix.multiplySelf( object.matrix );
to
rotationMatrix.multiply( object.matrix );

Answer 5

In Three.js R59, object.rotation.setEulerFromRotationMatrix(object.matrix); has been changed to object.rotation.setFromRotationMatrix(object.matrix);

3js is changing so rapidly :D

Answer 6

Just in case...in r52 the method is called setEulerFromRotationMatrix instead of getRotationFromMatrix

Answer 7

Somewhere around r59 this gets easier (rotate around x):

bb.GraphicsEngine.prototype.calcRotation = function ( obj, rotationX)
{
    var euler = new THREE.Euler( rotationX, 0, 0, 'XYZ' );
    obj.position.applyEuler(euler);
}

Answer 8

In Three.js R66, this is what I use (CoffeeScript version):

THREE.Object3D.prototype.rotateAroundWorldAxis = (axis, radians) ->
  rotWorldMatrix = new THREE.Matrix4()
  rotWorldMatrix.makeRotationAxis axis.normalize(), radians
  rotWorldMatrix.multiply this.matrix
  this.matrix = rotWorldMatrix
  this.rotation.setFromRotationMatrix this.matrix

Answer 9

I solved in this way:

I created the 'ObjectControls' module for ThreeJS that allows you to rotate a single OBJECT (or a Group), and not the SCENE.

Include the libary:

<script src="ObjectControls.js"></script>

Usage:

var controls = new ObjectControls(camera, renderer.domElement, yourMesh);

You can find here a live demo here: https://albertopiras.github.io/threeJS-object-controls/

Here is the repo: https://github.com/albertopiras/threeJS-object-controls.